Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Dresden 2 v. Dresden 3

I've finished the second book in The Dresden Files, Fool Moon. It had several good things going for it. Harry Dresden comes along as a great character, lots of good magic explanations, and a truly vicious werewolf thing that was one part Rin Tin Tin and seventeen parts Terminator. It was a basically solid and enjoyable book. The one thing that annoyed me as a writer and a reader was Butcher's timing. Characters simply say and think too many things while the werewolves are charging at them from a few feet away. Not only does the timing issue arise in close quarters combat, it happens on a larger scale as well. Too many things are going on in what seems to me as too short a time frame.

Now for a word on Book 3, Grave Peril. It is very good right out of the gate. Butcher employs one of my favorite tricks as a writer. He starts with the second chapter instead of the first. The story opens with him and some other character racing across town to stop something awful from happening. You have no idea what is going on but it is exciting nonetheless. Then you have a very eerie scene between the good guys and a ghost that is in a ward full of newborns, sweetly singing them to death.